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The Mexican Revolution and the 
Nationalization of the Land 

The Foreign Interests and Reaction 

by / t> «ta« 

DOCTOR ATL 

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VVhiteh.\i,l Bldg, Room 334, New York 
1915 






MAY S 191$ ^ 






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The Mexican Revolution and the 
Nationalization of the Land 

The Foreign Interests and Reaction 

by 

DOCTOR ATL 



This pamphlet is the translation of a speech delivered by Dr. Atl 
at the "Teatro Principal" in Vera Crus, December 4th, 1914. 

Dr. Atl is very well-known in Mexico, Italy and France as an 
artist, writer and thinker of great force, originality and talent. 



The Nation and its Parties — ^The Critical Moment for Action. 

Rigorously speaking, the political parties in Mexico may be divided 
into four classes. 

The party of Villa, which represents reaction in three forms : 
specific barbarism, embodied in the primitive man, General Villa; 
militarism represented by General Angeles, and the capitalist and 
clerical intrigue synthethized by Dr. Silva, the lawyer Miguel Diaz 

Lombardo and Somerfeld the Tew. 

\ -' 

The party of Zapata, whose existence is due principally to the 
hunger of the masses and the secular Spanish oppression. The 
tendencies of this party — although some of its politicians pretend to 
give it a socialist-revolutionary, or rather syndicalist character — are 
exclusively communist. 

The third division is that of the undecided — the civilians and 
army-men from all over the Republic who have not had a sufficient 
understanding of the situation to adopt a course of action and assist 
in the regeneration of their country. 

The fourth class is formed by the party known until now as the 
Constitutionalist party, and which in spite of its essentially legal 
name, carries in itself the most fruitful germs of a thorough social 
reform. Having accomplished the mission of overthrowing General 
Huerta and annihilating the Federal Army, it must now put into 
execution in a determined manner, the reforms which the urgent needs 
of the country demand. 

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I would ask — "Which of these four groups is able to give, not 
only to the Nation, but to the whole American Continent, an assurance 
of moral and material advancement? In which of these parties is the 
spirit of liberty and justice more deeply rooted?" 

National spirit, weak and hesitating, cannot be concretely repre- 
sented, because a series of disunited manifestations cannot be repre- 
sented logically and concretely. If these reforms are to produce 
results they should be made effective in spite of all obstacles put in 
their way by ancient prejudices, written laws and foreign interests. 

The moral, political and military conditions which exist in the 
Constitutionalist party as present, combine the most aprpopriate means 
for developing those principles which are to give our country the 
liberty and prosperity which it has always missed. 



A Trinity of Evil-Doers. 

Let us analyze at a glance some of the elements composing the 
Northern Division, which is represented by a trio creative of evil, 
perpetrator of hideous crimes and protector of all the political and 
social cast-offs of the past. This Trinity is composed of the lawyer 
Miguel Diaz Lombardo, a dissipated Jesuit; General Angeles, a man 
moulded after porfirian ideas — a hypocrite by birth and a soldier by 
profession; and General Villa, a product of the quaternary period, 
who, by a phenomenon of retrogression, which after all is no un- 
common thing in our country, since we have had to our shame a Por- 
firio Diaz and a Victoriano Huerta — sprung up from the plains of 
Chihuahua, bearing all the animal characteristics of the first quad- 
rupeds which inhabited our planet. 

These two men and this brute, can neither conceive nor make, 
any political or social reforms which could tend to benefit a people. 
They are after individual gain, they defend the interests of corpora- 
tions which have been the cause in Mexico of political disturbances 
and the oppression of the people and which are : the clergy, the army 
and foreign investors. 

Diaz Lombardo, a man of unpretentious manners, patient and 
foxy, has been the intellectual director of Villa's treachery, with 
General Angeles as a medium. He suggested and guided the acts of 
General Angeles from the time that Angeles went to Paris with a 
special commission from General Huerta, and he continued to counsel 
him from the French Capital by cable and written communications, 
after General Angeles arrived on the field of action. 

I was unable to undei stand certain strange acts of some of the 
mem.bers of the Revolutionary Committee in Paris and specially of 
Diaz Lombardo, unil I arrived in Washington in the month of June 
when the rebellion in Torreon broke out. I then cabled to differet 
members of the Revolutionary Committee in Paris, and from their 
replies it was easy to see that Diaz Lombardo and other members of 

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said Committee had thought it convenient to come out in the open. 
It was then that Diaz Lombardo decided to return to Mexico so as to 
exert his influence more directly over Villa and Angeles. 

Among other efforts made by these three men to deal a decisive 
blow to Constitutionalism, there was one feat of a piratical character 
which came very near being successfully accomplished. Angeles and 
Diaz Lombardo, feigning great zeal for the Constitutionalist cause, 
for which they claimed to be working, took steps to purchase a steamer 
in Italy for the sum of i 100,000 — sterling, with the idea of fitting it 
out for war, and taking possession of Matamoros and Tampico by 
surprise. This scheme came very near being successful, and Diaz 
Lombardo himself was getting ready to go and put himself at the head 
of the expedition, dreaming dreams of himself as the modern Con- 
queror of the New World! Unfortunately for them, the Cientificos 
taking part in this enterprise were distrustful, either of the seaman- 
ship of Diaz Lombardo, or of Villa's docility, or they could not get 
together sufficient money to buy the phantom ship. But the fact 
remains that the deal was almost put through and that a commission 
of foreigners left Paris to go to Genoa to inspect the ship, take 
possession of it and set out for Mexico. Had this feat been realized, 
what an interesting account of "Pirates in Frock-coats" Venegas 
Arroyo might have written for us ! 

Diaz Lombardo has been an unlucky star to our country, both in 
his administrative and individual activities during the revolutionary 
period following the overthrow of General Diaz. Two facts supply 
ample proof of this : his recommending or rather imposing General 
Huerta on Madero as Chief of the Army, and his introducing General 
Angeles in the Constitutionalist party. The two proteges of the Ex- 
Secretary of the Educational Department have produced two national 
catastrophes. 

The Northern Faction an Obstacle to Liberty and Justice. 

To describe Villa Avould be a useless task. If all his actions did 
not suffice to bring to light the barbarism of this Neanderthal savage, 
the declarations made by General Alvarado and the photograph ac- 
companying same, plainly reveal the character of the individual whom 
the capitalist-clerical-military league are using as a tool to drag the 
country back into another and a worse state of oppression. This 
photograph published by General Alvarado, is the most stinging ac- 
cusation ever made against the leader of a party. The synthetic force 
and indisputable exactness of photographic art have made in this 
instance a more clear and convincing illustration than could have been 
made by the most accomplished caricaturist of our times. As to 
General Angeles, the fact that he is an Indian, brought up in military 
training during the time of General Diaz, is sufficient to understand 
that behind his apparent modesty and discipline, hides the hand of a 
tyrant. 



Besides the three men just described, there are in the Northern 
Division, as everybody knows, a great many lawyers, commission 
merchants, newspaper men, and ambitious Mexicans and foreigners, 
representing everything under the sun, except the interests of the 
nation. 

Moreover the Northern Division, apart from its political and 
clerical tendencies, and of being the genuine representative of inter- 
national capitalism, carries in itself as its primal reason of existence, 
the pretorian spirit of most abject militarism. This alone would 
suffice to issue its death-warrant. 

If the Diaz-Ivombardo-Angeles-Villa facton were able to obtain 
preponderance in our country, it would be preferable for the sake of 
civilization in general and for our reputation in particular, to make 
of our whole country, one great, big bonfire. To crush that faction, 
even at the risk of being crushed ourselves, is not only our duty to 
our country, but it is also our duty to humanity. Its growth would be 
a serious obstacle to the cause of Liberty, Justice and Progress in 
America. 



The Biggest Error of the Zapatistas. 

The Zapatistas committed the grave error of allying themselves 
with Villa. The principles of the Zapatistas and Villistas are anti- 
thetical. The Revolution of the South is a violent outbreak of an 
intense popular need; it commands respect in spite of its errors and 
it is just although transgressions might have been committed in its 
name. It is the spontaneous manifestation of an oppressed people, 
generated by hunger and secular oppression. 

The Northern Division is the champion of the interests of foreign 
capitalists, the shield of the clergy and the embryo of militarism. How 
did it happen that the men of the South entered into an alliance with 
their own enemies? I believe this alliance can be explained as the 
result of a simple grudge. Spite felt by the men of the southern 
faction because the Constitutionalists passed them unnoticed without 
asking them to take part in the provisional Government which was 
established in Mexico at the exit of Carvajal. 

When on October last. General Zapata told me of his intention 
to ally himself to General Villa, I did everything in my power to 
make him give up this idea, but my efforts were fruitless, as were 
also those of some of his followers, who were opposed to an alliance 
with Villa. The cleverness and perseverance of General Villa's agents 
had already misled the freedom-loving tendencies of the healthy ele- 
ment of the Southern Revolution, and had even got General Zapata's 
intransigence to yield. 

This intransigence of General Zapata, which remained unabated 
in the face of five presidents — this intransigence, which was the fruit 
of a great faith and which constituted an undeniable moral strength 



succumbed in a moment of political sentimentalism, and by an irony 
of fate, fell precisely into the hands of the one enemy of the southern 
revolution, and that is : reaction. 

What occurred in connection with the Zapatistas, can be com- 
pared to a not uncommon phenomenon sometimes seen in the human 
body. When a part of the human mechanism does not perform its 
duty, it stiffens and becomes paralyzed. Zapata's army, secluded in 
the mountains was anxious to do its duty in national politics — but 
intercourse being cut off between them and the other national move- 
ment, when their time came for doing their duty to the nation, they 
were unfit for the part, deprived of political tactics. And the intellects 
of the Southern Revolution were tangled up in the affair, and thus 
used, through the craft of Angeles and Villa. 

Zapatismo, which was for more than five years the most genuine 
revolutionary movement of our history, rapidly changed into a danger- 
ous element of reaction, because of the assistance it is giving the 
Northern Division, and because the elements of intense fanatism 
which it carries might assume gigantic proportions in a short time. 

Zapatismo and Villismo united form an indefensible anomaly. 

From the view-point of principle and also from a military point 
of view, there are only two solutions possible ; either the partial ab- 
sorption of the revolutionary groups of the south by Villismo, or the 
sudden disintegration of the elements which pretend to form this new 
league, which might be given the absurd title of "Military Libertarian." 
In either case, reaction will have gained ground. 

Those forming the undecided, hesitating portion, who during 
social perturbations constitute the wavering mass which may at any 
moment go to swell the ranks of one or the other side — these slowly 
make up their minds to join one or the other, but not until they have 
made sure which side will come out victorious. 

Large is the number of men on whom the republic had built 
great hopes, who have succumbed in a moment of political uncon- 
sciousness, and how many popular groups, carried away by the treach- 
ery of one man, have made an obstacle, however transient, to the 
onward march of progress ! The Revolution should knock at the 
conscience of these men and these groups — the spirit of justice, the 
cause, demand it! 

Constitutionalism Alone can Guarantee the Rights of the People. 

The fourth category is the Constitutionalist party, which combines 
military and intellectual elements, vivified by the true revolutionary 
spirit. This is the party that can guarantee to the oppressed land of 
Anahuac, the well-being and rights of its inhabitants, but this with the 
condition that the reforms to be made shall be thoroughly and rapidly 
executed. 



The Constitutionalist party is, among all those taking part in the 
present struggle, the one that best understands the interests of the 
people. The men surrounding the First Chief are those who have 
rnost to heart, the desire of satisfying the people's requirements and 
the military element which surrounds him is also the one which can 
successfully eliminate all obstacles which oppose the realization of the 
reforms demanded by the people. 

The First Chief stated in a clear and definite manner, the very 
night he arrived in Vera Cruz "To-day begins the social revolution." 
This is well understood by some of the most valuable military and 
civil elements who, arriving in this heroic little city from the capital, 
have firmly decided to collaborate with him. But at the present 
moment, the party lacks cohesion — its acts are not unanimous, either 
from a political, or military point of view. 

This is a critical moment for the nation and also for the party! 
It is now that we must keep our minds clear and our pulses firm, so 
that we may be able to steer clear of the rocks ! I know well that in 
the strong hearts and healthy minds of the brave men who are used 
to wrestling with nature in the mountains and forests, a ruling tend- 
ency to righteousness predominates — the kind of righteousness that 
will help to clear the chaos of the present situation, but I also know 
that if all the parts that form the whole do not work in harmony, 
and if each man or group of men tries to impose his views — if the 
efforts are not united and strong and do not act independently of 
existing prejudgments and interests, the struggle will be prolonged 
indefinitely, and when we look for the body of the Nation, in order 
to heal its wounds, we shall find instead a corpse. 

We have made mistakes, and some of them serious — as is that 
of not having proclaimed the nationalization of the lands — agrarian 
question — as is also that of having tolerated the interference of foreign 
nations in our interior affairs -(tacit consent of foreign intervention) 
also having neglected the propaganda of our views, in our own country 
and throughout the world : dangerous neglect, which our enemies have 
intelligently used to their advantage. 

The solutions found for the agrarian problem are very vague. 
Programs for the solution of this same question in different countries 
where the same difficulty has come up, may be divided into three 
different headings. 

The first and simplest is the one which tries to solve the problem 
by the law ; respecting the rights of proprietorship and permitting the 
wealthy to remain the owners of the lands, without giving the people 
who work these lands the slightest possibility of ever coming into the 
possession of that which rightfully belongs to them. This program, 
as well as all those where Law is brought to bear, is altogether out of 
the question and cannot even be considered by the Revolution. 

The next and second soluton is that by which all lands and 
properties seized are returned to their owners, whether they be cor- 

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porations or individuals, and which provides for the confiscation of 
lands not cultivated, which are to be divided among the people. 

The third and best solution is the one that a social revolution 
should propose to carry out, and that is : the nationalization of the 
land. This is the program that our revolution should adopt. Like all 
great transformations, this solution frightens the Revolutionists them- 
selves. But it is the right one, and why hesitate? All the land, from 
Bravo to Yucatan, should be confiscated in the name of the people 
and this regardless of individual rights or foreigners' properties. 
Why should we respect the concessions made to Pearson, or the 
wholesale robberies of Inigo Noriega, or the usurpation of natives and 
foreigners in Morelos, in Puebla, and lastly of the neo-Cientificos in 
the States of Chihuahua and Durango ? 

International complications should not deter us. In the first place 
we have the right to do justice, and secondly — at present the European 
nations are sufficiently occupied in settling their complicated and 
somewhat dubious affairs, to attempt to interfere with us while we 
accomplish the noblest act of social justice done in these modern 
times ! 

Some other time I shall explain in detail, my idea for the nationali- 
zation of the lands. 



The Problem of Distribution of Lands Does Not Exist. 

If we are to believe history, we are now at the most opportune 
moment in which to realize the dream of free men, who in all the 
ages have protested — from either a philosophical or scientific, or 
practical point of view — against the monstrous injustice of the earth 
being monopolized for the benefit of those who do not work it. It is 
our sacred duty to accomplish a task of national recovery — which is at 
the same time an act of elevated and practical philanthropy. Inter- 
national Socialism — which comprises a large number of clear-minded 
men who are struggling for economic equality in every country — will 
assist us in our task. 

In Mexico, we would never arrive at a just and final solution of 
what is called the "agrarian problem" if we satisfy ourselves with 
handing back to the different localities and townships, the properties 
taken from them— and with confiscating the properties held by the 
favourites of Diaz, Huerta or Villa. 

As a matter of fact, the problem of the distribution of lands does 
not exist — but there exists the complicated problem of "the distribution 
of the land." The land that has been abused, confiscated, trampled 
underfoot, covered with blood, for the exclusive benefit of a group of 
native and foreign promoters, who squander in the decorating of a 
palatial residence of vulgar taste, or in the cabarets of Montmartre 
the hard-gained earnings of a people who has been going hungry for 
the last three hundred years ! 

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This hunger of the mases is precisely the biggest factor of all 
national revolutions. If we have not the courage to give the people 
what belongs to them by natural rights and by the rights of conquest — 
for it is they who cultivate the earth and make it yield — they will 
continue to clamor, always and forever, for that which is unquestion- 
ably theirs. We must not hesitate any longer — injustice has reigned 
supreme long enough — let us now deal justice to them. Justice must 
be done now, and it must be done quickly. And we must give the 
people the land not according to the theories of Kropotkin, or the 
resolutions of the legislators of New Zealand, or the decision of a 
magnanimous Russian monarch, or following the theories of this or 
that French or German socialist, or following the wise suggestions of 
some group of bankers, or some economist on the style of Leroy- 
Beaulieu— NO— WE MUST GIVE THE LAND TO THE PEOPLE 
FOLLOWING THE ONE AND ONLY LAW WHICH SHOULD 
GOVERN THE PROPRIETORSHIP OF THE LAND— "The 
earth belongs to him who works it." 

And here in Mexico the land is not tilled by Inigo Noriega, nor 
Pablo Macedo, nor the Pearson people — it is worked by eight million 
men, who are nevertheless, homeless and starving, and who are given 
the right to live, only in order to be made slaves in the name of foreign 
diplomacy, or to be degraded in the interests of public peace. 

Nature gives every man the right to a piece of land. 

That former generations have not been able to enforce this right, 
is no reason why WE should not proclaim it and enforce it, in spite 
of all written laws, ancestral prejudices, or the phantom fear of inter- 
national intervention. 

A Shameful Tutelage. 

If the European nations ever should dare to intervene with armed 
forces in Mexico, such an intervention would not be more degrading 
to our dignity, nor more harmful to our interests, than is tlie vicious 
pressure exercised by them from the time of General Diaz. This 
illegal pressure is nothing more nor less than a shameful tutelage, or, 
to express it more clearly, a political intervention which grievously 
harms the honor of the nation and the welfare of its inhabitants. 

While we remain under this influence, and in fear of the threat 
of European powers, we shall be able to make no useful reforms of a 
comprehensive nature, and the whole life of the nation will continue 
to depend on the unsatiable ambition of an oil-developig firm, and on 
the grasping insolence of a group of Spaniards. 

Without quoting any isolated facts to show to what a degree 
Mexico has been under foreign influence, it will be sufficient to recall 
that when Madero's Government was overthrown, a government which 
was essentially popular, the foreign diplomats in Mexico contributed 
to a great extent, both morally and materially, to this overthrow — 

8 



and the recognition of General Huerta as president, and his duration 
in power, was due to the influence of the Pearson people in London, 

"There is no doubt, affirms the SUN, that great efforts were made 
in England to force the Minister of Foreign Relations to come to an 
agreement with the present Mexican Government. No one is ignorant 
of the fact that the British Minister of Foreign Relations was acting 
under secret orders as regards Huerta's recognition, and the fact of 
Huerta remaining always very friendly to that nation, is no secret. 
Everyone may draw his own conclusions, but one might ask without 
indiscretion if the Oil concessions given to the English company were 
not a part of the agreement." 

Great Britain had changed the system of fueling her navy, 
substituting petroleum for coal. Petroleum could not be found 
cheap and in sufficiently great quantities, in Russia or the Balkans, 
so the Pearson people devoted long years and large sums of money 
to find oil deposits in Mexico. They found them, and the Diaz' admini- 
stration gave them fabulous concessions : The improvement of the port 
of Vera Cruz, and the right to work, in conditions which were ruinous 
for Mexico, the oil-lands of the States of Vera Cruz and Tamaulipas. 

When Diaz fell, the Revolutionary Government annulled the con- 
cessions given to the Pearson people. Madero was an obstacle in the 
way of the ambitions of the British company, and of the needs of the 
British fleet. The diplomatic corps in the capital vilely aided the 
English representative and Lane Wilson, U. S. Ambassador. 

When Victoriano Huerta took the reins of the government, he 
was immediately recognized by the British Government and everyone 
will recall how this recognition of the British Government caused 
much surprise in all the political circles of Europe, which gave rise 
to an appeal by the House of Commons on the 8th of July, 1913. This 
appeal, voiced by Mr. Johnson Hinks, brought no satisfactory reply. 
Huerta not only confirmed to Lord Cowdray the concessions given by 
Diaz, but he gave new privileges to Lord Cowdray himself as well as 
to his representatives, the Belgian syndicates and European ministers. 

These concessions were so exorbitant that Lord Charles Beresford 
declared, on August 17th, 1914, that any other Government outside of 
Huerta's was entitled to revise the concessions to Lord Cowdray, 
because they were onerous and scandalous. 

The permanence of General Huerta in power is due mostly to 
the diplomatic and financial assistance of the Pearson people, for it 
was through them that General Huerta was able to obtain in Europe, 
money, arms and official protection. But we must add that the official 
circles of Germany gave efficient help to the usurper, and we shall 
not forget that it was the Emperor of Germany who lent to his 
colleague, Victoriano Huerta, a German warship which enabled Huerta 
to elude the punishment he so well deserved! 

These underhand transactions are nothing short of an actual inter- 
vention in our interior affairs, and are infinitely more harmful to our 



national dignity and interests, than was the occupation of the port of 
Vera Cruz by the American troops. 

Let us therefore defy the threats of Europe, and tear the mask 
off the faces of these foreign commercial intriguers ! This is the only 
way in which we shall be able to make in our country,^ the economic, 
political and social reforms which the nations has been demanding 
for so many years. 

Propaganda Has Strengthened Reaction. 

To make our actions more effect ^e, we must diffuse our principles 
throughout the country, and organize an extensive propaganda in 
defense of our ideas, in our own country and also outside — similar 
to what is being done by Argentina. 

The reaction which has sprung up and which is headed to-day by 
Villa and Angeles, has made itself known, not in the battles of Tor- 
reon and Zacatecas, but by its propaganda in the United States, Paris 
and London. The conditions of modern life make it impossible to 
bring a campaign of any kind to a successful end, without the aid of 
the press. 

The publicity we give our revolution in foreign countries, will 
reflect back upon our own country, after gaining the sympathy and 
assistance of the world, which it richly deserves. 

From the time of Francisco Madero, international propaganda in 
favor of the Revolution has been neglected. From 1913 to 1914, when 
I was carrying on a revolutionary publicity campaign in Paris, I was 
able to fathom the political importance which the press and public 
opinion have in the success of enterprises of any kind, not excepting 
those of a political and social nature. If in Europe, America and 
Asia, we do not proclaim and defend, the nobleness of our principles 
and the aims of our Revolution — after mastering our own country, 
we shall find difficulties awaiting us on the outside which will not be 
easily overcome. The publicity and information service organized by 
our enemies in the United States and Europe, have done much harm 
to our cause. 

The Effects of our Revolution may attain a World-Wide Importance. 

The Mexican Revolution is one of the keenest manifestations 
of the world's conflict. It portrays the character of the conflagration 
that is so violently shaking the world. The telluric, racial, economic 
and political conditions of Mexico, put us in a position to solve, in a 
satisfactory manner and for the benefit of the whole continent, the 
great social problems which confront us. The reforms effected in 
Mexico by this revolutionary movement, may serve the world as an 
example of a true social renovation and true justice, and our action 
may attain universal importance, if we make it thorough and unpre- 
judiced. 

10 



The disintegrations which have taken place within the revolution 
must not frighten or discourage us — they are the inevitable conse- 
quence of the deep commotion of the whole organism. In other words : 
a natural selection of the different elements which constitute the 
character, aspirations, ambitions and needs — ^the life — of the race. 

The one essential thing is that during these commotions, the men 
and the principles which must guide the afflicted conscience of the 
nation, remain unshaken. 

"The social revolution is going to begin" has said the First Chief — 
but how? 

We are not confronting an ideological problem. We have before 
us real necessities which must be analyzed fearlessly and firmly, and 
we must find for these necessities, not arbitrary solutions, as required 
by one group or another, but solutions which will completely satisfy 
the irresistible necessities of the whole nation. 

If the program we adopt satisfies completely the necessities of 
the masses, all the world will second our efiforts. But if we fear to 
destroy the past and do not act regardless of created interests — if 
we fear to trample down barbarous beliefs and mercenary diplomats 
and limit ourselves to partial reforms of existing evils, and weakly 
considerations — the world will either freeze us with its indifference 
or oppose our action — and the people of Mexico will continue to bear 
the yoke of oppression and misery in the midst of a fruitless struggle ! 



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